The Half Deamon
by Icka M. Chif
Summary: An adaptaion of the classic story 'The Highway Man'. Yeah, all angsty and all that mush. yuck.


Disclaimer: I always hated the story of The Highwayman. 1: It's a romantic story. 2: It's a sad story. 3: It's both those things in poetry. And yet here's this adaptation of it. *sigh.* I hate my Voices sometimes. All standard disclaimers apply.   
  
  
The Half Deamon  
By Icka! M. Chif  
  
  
The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees   
  
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon the cloudy seas   
  
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor   
  
And the half deamon dog came flying--   
  
Flying-- Flying--   
  
Inu-yasha came flying, up to Lady Kaede's-door.   
  
  
  
He'd ivory hair graced his head, a necklace of prayer beads at his chin   
  
A coat of fire rat hair, long pants made of the skin;   
  
The sleeves flew out like wings, they were tied with a red-ribbon tie.   
  
And he flew with a jeweled twinkle,   
  
His amber eyes a-twinkle,   
  
His katana hilt a-twinkle, under the velvet sky.   
  
  
  
Over the trees he floated and flew in the dark shrine-yard   
  
And he tapped with his claws on the shutters, but all was locked and barred.   
  
he muttered a curse to the window, and who should be sitting there,   
  
But his first love's re-incarnate,   
  
Kagome, Kikyo's re-incarnate,   
  
Studying math homework with meticulous care.   
  
  
  
"You coming, you silly twit? We're after a shard tonight!"   
  
"You know Inu-yasha, I have school by the morning light;   
  
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,   
  
Then look for me by moonrise,   
  
Watch for me by moonrise,   
  
I'll come through the well by moonrise, though school should bar the way."   
  
  
  
She left in the dawning. She come back in late afternoon;   
  
And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,   
  
When the road was a gypsy's ribbon, looping the purple moor,   
  
A deamon troop came marching--   
  
Marching--marching--   
  
Naraku's men came marching, up to the old house-door.   
  
  
  
They said no word to Kaede. They taunted her late sister instead.   
  
But they gagged Kagome, and bound her, to the bottom of the window ledge.   
  
Two of them knelt at her casement, with weapons at their side!   
  
There was death at every window;   
  
And hell at one dark window;   
  
For Kagome could see, through her casement, the path that he would fly.   
  
  
  
They had tied her up to attention, with many a demeaning jest.   
  
They had bound the head staff beside her, with the top beneath her breast!   
  
"Now, keep good watch!" and they scorned her. She heard herself say--   
  
Look for me by moonrise;   
  
Watch for me by moonrise;   
  
I'll come through the well by moonrise, though school should bar the way!   
  
  
  
She twisted her hands behind her; but all the knots held good!   
  
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood!   
  
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years,   
  
Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,   
  
Cold, on the stroke of midnight,   
  
The tip of one finger touched it! The head staff at least was hers!   
  
  
  
The tip of one finger touched it. She strove no more for the rest.   
  
Up, she stood up to attention, with the heads beneath her breast,   
  
She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive again;   
  
For the sky lay bare in the moonlight;   
  
Blank and bare in the moonlight;   
  
And the blood of her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to her friend's refrain.   
  
  
  
Hsh-hsh; hsh-hsh! Had they heard it? The deamon's flight sighing clear;   
  
Hsh-hsh; hsh-hsh, in the distance? Were they deaf that they did not hear?   
  
Through the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,   
  
The half deamon dog came flying--   
  
Flying--flying--   
  
The deamons looked to their priming! She stood up, straight and still.   
  
  
  
Hsh-hsh, in the frosty silence! Hsh-hsh, in the echoing night!   
  
Nearer he came and nearer. Her face was pale with fright.   
  
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep breath,   
  
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,   
  
The head staff screamed in the moonlight,   
  
Cut her down in the moonlight and warned him-with her death.   
  
  
  
He charged. His back to the west, he did not know she stood   
  
Bowed, with her head o'er the staff, drenched with her own blood!   
  
Not till the dawn he heard it, and his face grew pale to hear   
  
How Kagome, his first love's re-incarnate,   
  
Kagome, Kikyo's re-incarnate,   
  
Had watched for her friend in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.   
  
  
  
Lost, he fought like a madman, shouting curses to the sky,   
  
With the white road smoking behind him and his katana brandished high.   
  
Blood-red were his claws in the golden noon; wine-red was his fur-rat coat;   
  
When they shot him down on the courtyard.   
  
Down like a dog on the courtyard,   
  
And he lay in his blood on the courtyard, with the prayer beads at his throat.   
  
  
  
And still of a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,   
  
  
When the moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon the cloudy seas   
  
When the road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor   
  
And the half deamon dog comes flying--   
  
Flying-- Flying--   
  
Inu-yasha comes flying, up to Lady Kaede's-door.   
  
  
Fin. 


End file.
